The Institute For Educational Leadership Inc

Programs: Center for workforce development since 1991, the center for workforce development (cwd) has helped public and private sector leaders promote career readiness and successful transitions to adulthood for all youth - with a special focus on youth with disabilities and other disconnected youth - by increasing the capacity of and connections among all stakeholders in the workforce development system. Cwd's research, training, technical assistance, and materials focus on: assisting educators, workforce development professionals, employers, and policymakers in bridging school and workplace, learning and earning; establishing standards, assessments, and tools to improve quality, connections, and collaborations; improving the involvement and relationship of employers to learning and training enterprises and the broader workforce development system; assisting youth and their families in navigating the road to adulthood, from school to additional education, careers and independent/community living; and, promoting the development of career pathways for youth service professionals. Major initiatives of the center for workforce development include: the national collaborative on workforce and disability for youth is composed of partners with expertise in disability, education, employment, and workforce development issues. The collaborative is charged with assisting state and local workforce development systems to integrate youth with disabilities into their service strategies. The collaborative is housed at the institute for educational leadership in washington, dc. The collaborative strives to ensure that youth with disabilities are provided full access to high quality services in integrated settings to maximize their opportunities for employment and independent living. The professional development initiative identifies the knowledge, skills and abilities that professionals working directly with youth need to better connect all young people to education, workforce, and independent living opportunities and builds the capacity of these youth service professionals to affect positive outcomes for all youth, including those with disabilities and other disconnected youth. The ready to achieve mentoring program (ramp) - the ready to achieve mentoring program (ramp) is a high tech, career-focused mentoring program for youth, including those with disabilities involved with or at-risk of becoming involved with the juvenile justice system. Funded by the department of justice's office of juvenile justice and delinquency prevention (ojjdp) and led by the institute for educational leadership (iel), ramp is being implemented at 10 sites across the country by state and local organizations with expertise in mentoring, youth development, and/or disability. The ramp model utilizes a combination of group, peer, and one-on-one mentoring to promote the successful transition of ramp youth to employment, continued learning opportunities, and independent living. The right turn career-focused training initiative serves juvenile offenders, providing comprehensive reentry and transition services, including connection to education, mentoring, soft skill building, workforce development, and violence prevention. Funded by the u. S. Department of labor's employment and training administration, five local sites operate right turn in different communities: kentuckianaworks, louisville, ky; peckham, inc. , lansing, mi; oasis center, nashville, tn; playa vista jobs, los angeles, ca; and goodwill industries of houston, houston, tx. The high school/high tech program is an effective strategy for improving post-high school outcomes for youth with all types of disabilities. The program is designed to address the full array of needs of transition-age youth with disabilities, including exposure to science, technology, engineering, math, and technology-related careers. Dc advocacy partners is a leadership training program for self-advocates and family members of children with intellectual/developmental disabilities. Participants gain leadership skills and develop positive partnerships with elected officials and school and community leaders. Participants engage in interactive learning and gain valuable information about current issues, services, and policymaking and legislative processes. The ncwd/youth-sponsored youth action council on transition (youthact) was launched in january at an initial orientation meeting held in washington, d. C. Youthact is an initiative to strengthen youth voice in five communities to become ambassadors to improve transition programs and services across multiple systems. Youthact teams include two youth and one adult partner from new jersey, rhode island, dc, tennessee, and california. Youth workforce leaders academy for the greater washington workforce development collaborative is a one-year initiative that draws from iel's leadership development and youth service professionals' knowledge, skills and abilities projects. It is an example of local funding of a national framework.

center for family, school and community for nearly 20 years, iel has assisted schools, communities, and other key stakeholders in building intentional partnerships that achieve better results for every young person, from early childhood to adulthood. The center's research, policy, and network development focuses on: identifying and conducting research on school-community connections; cultivating networks and opportunities for local collaboratives to improve practice, share successes, and improve results for children, families, and communities; and, developing policies at all levels of government that support joint action to improve outcomes for children, families, and communities. Major initiatives of the center for family, school and community include: the coalition for community schools, in operation since 1997, is a national alliance that brings together school and community leaders to advocate for schools as centers of their communities, with purposeful results-focused partnerships at their heart. With the support of a steering committee representing education, youth development, higher education, child and family services, and local government, iel has helped to make community schools 'central to reform' according to secretary of education, arne duncan. More than 100 communities now have major community school's efforts and are part of a learning community of local initiatives. Through the coalition, iel is leading efforts to have federal and state policy be more responsive to the community school strategy. Together with its coalition partners, iel has developed a results-framework and evaluation toolkit for community schools and conducts research on the effectiveness of community schools and how they are financed. The coalition for community schools also hosts a bi-annual conference which attracts a diverse array of practitioners, advocates, and policymakers looking to deepen partnerships between school and community. Iel's early childhood and community schools linkages project supports local leaders seeking to connect early childhood programs more closely with high quality elementary schools that have deep roots in the community. The linkages project began as a pilot is in tulsa, ok, multnomah county, or, and albuquerque, nm, and is now assisting community school initiatives around the country to better integrate early childhood programs with their broader community schools work to help students enter school ready to learn and achieve success by the end of 3rd grade. These communities are planning effective transitions for children and their families into elementary school, implementing effective family engagement practices, helping educators, and early childhood providers link their practices more explicitly, and over time working towards state policy that supports these efforts. Mind in the making-community schools project (mitm-cs) initiative serves as a model for early learning program developers, educators, and community partners on how to enhance and expand capacity to ensure high quality early learning opportunities for children and their families. Through established community school partnerships, six innovative sites have demonstrated comprehensive community surround strategies that have infused mitm and the seven essential skills into all aspects of early learning, family partnership, and comprehensive birth through eight program alignment and planning. During the 3-year pilot phase of this project more than 500 facilitators have been trained. Iel is working with partners at the families and work institute (fwi) on a major national expansion plan for the project, expanding mitm-cs to an additional 30 sites. District leaders network on family and community engagement (fce) - this peer learning and action network is devoted to strengthening systemic family engagement efforts in school districts and support their leadership development by helping school leaders, teachers and other district staff better engage parents, families, and community-based organizations. Iel convenes this network twice a year - during learning labs hosted by member districts (baltimore 2014; nashville 2015, and washington, dc 2016); and as a pre-conference activity during iel's national fce conferences. Over 130 school districts across the country have participated in network activities. Iel hosted its first national family and community engagement conference in cincinnati in 2014 with over 500 attendees. Most recently, the third annual conference in june 2016 under the theme owning our movement, maximizing our impact. Over 1200 educators, parents, district and state fce leaders, community organizers, teachers and other educators, and others were in attendance, and committed to sharing high impact, evidence-based family and community engagement strategies. Highlighting leadership at all levels and exciting local work in pittsburgh, the 2016 conference offered a variety of perspectives while examining how schools and communities around the country are realizing mutual goals and maximizing impact through productive family-school- community partnerships. Major plenaries, mini-plenaries and over 75 workshops will offer multiple learning opportunities on important themes and topics. Parents & teachers chat (ptchat) is a twitter-based weekly chat designed as a professional development conversation that enables parents, family engagement practitioners, teachers and other educators to develop new and innovative approaches to family-school-community partnerships.

center for leadership and policy over its more than 50-year history, iel has developed and supported leaders as they enhance their capacity to work across institutional boundaries, increase their professional and policy knowledge and expand their networks. This center's work focuses on: building and strengthening peer learning and action networks among leaders across sectors to build systemic capacity; informing leaders to make good policy choices and improvements; and, enabling leaders to move policy to effective practice. Major initiatives of the center for leadership and policy include: the education policy fellowship program (epfp) - in continuous operation since 1964 - is iel's flagship leadership development program, focusing on participants' leadership, policy, and networking abilities. Nearly 8,500 leaders across all 50 states from early childhood development, k-12, and higher education have participated in epfp, as well as people from other child, youth, and community support systems. They now serve as leaders in school systems, local, state and federal government, foundations, and community-based organizations. The 2016-17 epfp cohort will be the largest in epfp history with over 325 fellows across 16 states (al, ca, co, ct, ga, la, ma, mi, mn, mo, ms, ny, nc 2 sites, oh, pa, and sc) and the district of columbia. The kellogg leadership for community change (klcc) project offers grassroots community leaders the opportunity to share challenges and solutions through local and regional community learning exchanges and to contribute to national policy conversations. Since 2002, iel has worked with communities in 11 states to develop community-based leadership focused on engaging communities, families, and children living on the margins. Cross-generational leaders involved in these exchanges cut across race/ethnicity, as well as urban, suburban, and rural communities. Iel federal policy institutes present students, faculty members in post- graduate educational leadership programs, and other leaders with a birds- eye view of the national policy process. Leaders from congress, federal agencies - including the department of education, think-tanks, and national association and advocacy organizations help participants understand washington's inner workings and the implications for their work. The school leadership learning and action network is an emerging partnership with the principal leadership institute at uc berkeley aimed at developing a network of school leadership faculty and practitioners who share a desire to create a space and direction for a national conversation on leadership that more clearly aligns with community-based, student- centered values. This group will also examine the research base on leadership and leadership development, particularly as it relates to the race, culture, and equity challenges facing education in america today. Leaders for today and tomorrow (lt2) is a growing network of non-profits, school districts and schools of education committed to retooling pre- and in-service leadership learning and evaluation. Lt2 supports the catalytic role of principals, assistant principals and district leaders as community stewards serving schools in highly challenged environments across the u. S. The literacy innovation in rural education through collaboration (lirec) project will transform literacy learning in high needs rural schools, establishing a model for building capacity to produce sustainable gains in student learning, with a focus on preschool through grade 3 (ps-3). Lirec will be led by the institute for educational leadership, the national council of teachers of english, and the rural and community trust. It will work with literacy community action teams from the communities served by 13 local educational authorities (leas) in rural illinois, north carolina, vermont, west virginia, and arizona, serving 335 teachers; 83 paraprofessionals and 3991 students. In each community, lirec will ensure that students have access to books that are appropriate, engaging, and of interest at both home and school; develop teacher expertise in the research-based strategies for supporting literacy learning; create and implement a community literacy plan; and create a summer learning lab that provides not only research based instructional support for at-risk, ps-3 students but also advanced teachers' learning through peer observation, collaborative planning and reflection, and systematic evaluation by an external literacy expert. Throughout the year, lirec will provide intensive professional development onsite and online in conjunction with local communities of practice in which teachers will have dedicated time to participate. These interventions will lead to increased knowledge and use of effective literacy instructional practices by teachers; increases in students' time spent reading, motivation to read, and literacy achievement; and enhanced organizational and community capacity to sustain and build on these gains. Westat will evaluate how successful lirec is in producing these outcomes using a combination of case studies and a quasi-experimental design that incorporates a comparison group of schools.